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Now That He's Screwed Us For the 58th Time...

Welcome to Hope n' Change 2.0!

In the face of a collapsing economy, rampant unemployment, and global instability, Barack Hussein Obama took office in 2008 promising Hope and Change. The "Hope" thing didn't really work out, but we got plenty of "Change" as everything got worse. And now, the jug-eared jackass has a second term.

That's why at Hope n' Change Cartoons, we're creating conservative smartaleckry to provide a little laughter in these strange times. Cartoons will probably be posted Monday and Wednesday, and definitely on Friday. Additionally, cartoons and graphics will be posted randomly on our Facebook page and Friday we'll add the week's postings right here to kick around in one of the greatest comments sections on the Web.Note: please feel free to repost our cartoons on your favorite blogs!

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Monday, September 19, 2016

Today is International Talk Like a Pirate Day, which means a lot of people will be peppering their conversation with words like Avast and Matey, wearing ARR-gyle socks to ARR-bys for lunch, and telling jokes with punchlines like "It was me first day with the hook."

However, we think the real punchline is the revelation that the Clinton Family Foundation is practicing Act Like a Pirate Day every day! Specifically, IRS documents reveal that in the most recent year for which they have records (2014), the Foundation sent only 5.7% of its $91.3 million budget to the charitable causes which they've claimed are their primary reason for existing.

The non-profit (and untaxed) Foundation spent nearly 7 times that much on their own salaries, compensation, and what must be truly kick-ass benefits. And yet another $50 million on vaguely named "other expenses" which would normally be a red flag (if not an actually Jolly Roger) when spotted by the IRS.

Still, neither the IRS, DOJ, nor FBI has any real plans to investigate the Clinton Family Foundation for running an obvious charity fraud while peddling American influence to nasty overseas players.

But then again, we're pretty sure that "IRS," "DOJ," and "FBI" are all subcategories under "Other Expenses" for the Clinton Crime Family Foundation.

Speaking of which...

And Webb Hubbell's good looks!

No, but seriously...

29 people were hurt (thankfully, none killed) when a bomb detonated in the Chelsea neighborhood of New York. A second device, unexploded, was found a short distance away. And pipe bombs which exploded in New Jersey are thought to be related.

At the time of this writing, very little is known about who is responsible (unless the surviving Tsarnaev brother was out of jail on a weekend pass)...but it's a pretty safe bet who will be irresponsible for the umpteenth time. And yes, we're looking at you, Obama.

If the culprit(s) turn out to have an ideology that Barry can use to make political hay, we'll be hearing a lot about this story. If, on the other hand, there's no political value for Obama (or worse, facts which contradict his ongoing narrative) we're pretty sure this story will be dropped from the news cycles faster than you can say San Bernardino.

Methinks thar be a land lubber what's gonna be sent to the briney deep.At a Clinton rally someone shouted "Hillary for Prison", to which she immediately responded "let's make it happen":https://youtu.be/fMnretvQ6lcAn extra ration of rum for that swabby.

@Stilton,Are you suggesting that The Clinton Foundation sent money to the FBI, IRS and DOJ in return for political favors?! Why, that's just ludicrous. Bribing people who work for those agencies is illegal you know. Someone of Hillary's stature and good standing would NEVER do anything that even appeared illegal. You must be a sexist! I'll bet you're a racist too! How deplorable.

Seriously, I wish the Clintons would just go back to ARRR-kansas. (sorry, it's the best I can do).

@Geoff King,That's a good one! Ranks right up there with her "tax the middle class," Freudian slip.

Dave from The Cheesehead NationYears ago I thought that Jay Leno's "Man on the Street" was a put on, that people could not be that ignorant. Now I listen to the news and think those Leno people on the street were geniuses.

World traveler Mrs. Econ has been on my case lately because we haven't taken a "real" vacation since the beginning of the Obama era. I've promised her that should Hillary win in November, we'll be founding the "Econ Foundation", which will have a Progressive yet meaningless sounding mission statement, and will spend only half of its tax-tree money on overhead. The rest will be spent on stimulating the economies of people who make less much that we do as they service to our whims.

Has anyone else noticed that the regular media expose's on poorly run charities that blow most of their cash on "overhead" have largely disappeared over the last 6 months? I have a lot of Progressive friends who regularly post those on their social media feeds. (After they vote for Hillary, I'll be regularly reminding them of that) Should Hillary win, expect those to disappear for the next 4 to 8 years just as regular reports on the plight of "the homeless" have since 2008.

Last week, there was some noise made about Trump's charitable foundation, but that seems to have largely died, most likely because whatever fast-and-looseness may have been going on there, it couldn't possibly compare to the racket the Clintons have been running.

Not terrorism, but just an "intentional act": Of course, once again the knee-jerk Progressive reaction to any form of terrorism is to wish out loud that it's not. We're already awarding this week's de-nial award to New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, who seems to know of other uses for pressure cooker bombs set off in crowded urban centers than mere "terrorism".

The FBI has apprehended Ahmad Khan Rahami after a shootout with police. Mr. Rahami is from Afghanistan. But please don't jump to any conclusions.

Speaking of "intentional acts": Pushed off the pages by the goings on in NYC are a couple of other recent acts by other followers of the "religion of peace"...

"The man who stabbed nine people at a Minnesota mall Saturday before being shot dead by an off-duty police officer was a "soldier of the Islamic state," according to an ISIS-linked news agency."

These are now weekly events here, so much so that they're not even making national news anymore, kind of like fender-benders. What was once only common in far-away and exotic lands is now near-daily events in Europe. Now it's becoming the new normal here too. And it's going to get worse:

"The U.S. government has mistakenly granted citizenship to at least 858 immigrants from countries of concern to national security or with high rates of immigration fraud who had pending deportation orders, according to an internal Homeland Security audit released Monday. The Homeland Security Department's inspector general found that the immigrants used different names or birthdates to apply for citizenship with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services and such discrepancies weren't caught because their fingerprints were missing from government databases.

Hmmmm, "mistaken"? Next time one of your Progressive friends pulls that "They're all 'vetted'" card, refer to this. Their argument is weak enough without the abject incompetence of our Federal agencies that should give absolutely no confidence to anyone.

@TrickyRicky- I, for one, would like to hear "Crikey" used a lot more frequently.

@Judi King- I agree! In fact, go ahead and refuse to sell them to anyone who looks suspicious. There's no 2nd Amendment right to bear cookware!

@Geoff King- That person is an American hero! Regarding the Gatlin Brothers, I like the sentiment of the song and the performance, but in pure songwriting terms it felt a bit "forced." Still, those guys can sure harmonize - and the song has GOT to honk off Hillary!

@jlw- I didn't mean to exclude the stabbing spree today. Thank goodness there was a good man with a gun to end that situation before it got even worse. Again - an American hero.

@Fred Ciampi- I would imagine "no talking mean to girls" is one of the rules which will be vigorously enforced. Sheesh.

@chipmunk- They'll only demand a license if it's a high-capacity "assault" pressure cooker.

@Colby Muenster- Yeah, and this point I'll happily identify as a "deplorable." Irredeemable too, for that matter. And yes, I'm absolutely suggesting that the Clintons are spreading bribes where necessary, although I think the real currency is power rather than money.

@Colby Muenster- Not much slips by The Smartest President Ever.

@Dave- I think Jay cherry-picked the biggest idiots, but I'm afraid he still probably had a lot of material to work with. I remember seeing a segment (can't remember if it was Jay or perhaps Fox's Jesse Waters) in which people in New York were asked what the date of the 9/11 attacks was. Forget the year - there were scads who couldn't name the month or the date. Which means that they don't even know how "9/11" got it's freaking name. We're screwed...

@John the Econ- Good catch on the media suddenly being less interested in good accounting at charities. Similarly, the media (and Hillary) had a LOT to say about unsatisfied customers at Trump University until it was revealed that Bill Clinton received something like $17 million to be "honorary chancellor" of a for-pay university. After which Trump University was never mentioned again.

And nice summary of Muslim terror attacks over the past couple of days, in juxtaposition with the idiot Obama administration "accidentally" giving citizenship to people who were supposed to be deported as dangerous. Suddenly Trump's "extreme vetting" seems like a damn good idea.

@Stilton, also take note of the Obama war on evil "for profit" schools. ITT was the latest victim last week. It's interesting to note that Laureate International, the "for profit" school that made Bill Clinton one of the world's best paid university officials at almost $17-million seems to have escaped any Federal scorn. I'm sure the officials at ITT are now lamenting their failure to spread enough money around Washington.

It's the kids that are the problem: Once again in the wake of the NYC bombings, we have an example of how it's not the immigrants themselves that end up being "radicalized", but their kids that we have to be scared of.

Personally, I find this fascinating, if not scary. Why is this? I have my theories, including the notion that our materially wealthy yet spiritually empty and morally ambiguous secular society just isn't enough for these kids. Most of the world's other mainline religions are being watered down to irrelevance, and are now little more than organs of political correctness that cooperate with corrupt states. They recognize "Secular Humanism" and phony "multiculturalism" for what they are. America, founded on the notion of individual liberty is being "fundamentally transformed" into a balkanized society where the state only responds to citizens as part of special interest groups (racial, sexual, deplorables) and "victimization" is sold as virtue. A lot of people don't want to be seen or treated as "victims" their whole life.

Islam offers spiritual, moral and political clarity in a Progressive world that is constantly being stripped of it. For them, radicalized Islam may, in fact, be a logical choice.

So as true as it may be that "unvetted" refugees represents a significant security threat today, I think that in another 10 to 20 years, we're in for even bigger trouble from the children of people who were otherwise found to be harmless.

Good point, @Pete (Detroit). I too was a Boy Scout (surprise?) and it was a big part of my growing up, and who I eventually became. It taught me important lessons about leadership, self-reliance and fermented my love of the outdoors and environment. It's no surprise that Progressivism is at war with the Scout Oath and Law, which stresses "God and country". Perhaps that's why I have even greater respect for scouts these days as they are swimming against a much greater tide than I was against in a different age.

I'm still in Scouting for the third round in my life, as an elder Scouter this time with no child of my own in the program. We started a new troop a few years ago to replace one which lost it's chartered partner.

There's a lot of changes and still much progressive pressure trying to use Scouting as an example. But BSA has also become very commercialized; & it's more difficult to become & remain a properly trained Scouter. They have also become silly; like Scouts are not to shoot others with a squirt gun,those are only for target shooting. What bullshit. National Council doesn't much want to hear our old timer opinions. And the adults have changed while the Scouts have not; not much. In 1960's Scouting had about 5% of US population; now it's about 1%, and yet National Council, which has grown immensely, thinks they're doing a fine job. We could use more hard-ball defense of our values & quit trying to dictate troop programs.

First, bless you @Rod for your service to today's youth. I fondly remember many of the adults who gave of themselves when I was in scouting, and had such a positive effect on my life.

I've been away from scouting for over a generation now, so my only connection is with friends with kids involved. My impression was that a lot of change started happening in the late '80s, largely having to do with the "gay" issue. Scouting really became political and an outright enemy of the left when they outlawed gay scoutmasters in the '80s due to the various molestation lawsuits that were popping up. (The Boy Scouts lacked both the ability and resources to cover up the problem like the Catholics did) Of course, once that happened, the war was on, seemingly pushing scouting further to the right. The left demanded that homosexuals be formally allowed, which both morally and practically wasn't seen as an option. At the time, I was debating advocates suggesting that if this was what they really wanted, they should call for laws indemnifying the Boy Scouts from the kind of lawsuits that drove the original policy. Of course, I knew that this would never happen, as the economic interest of plaintiffs bar is even further up the Progressive values totem pole than homosexuals are.

My guess is that at the national level, as the old guard retired or gave up they were replaced by "professional" administrators more of the "get along" mindset. Hence, the watering down accelerated. I have friends who saw the same thing happening at the Girl Scouts as well. We're also hip deep in the age where the establishment has feminized most boys, and they're just moderating to what they think the market is.

So unfortunately, in the age of helicopter parenting and proto-pajama-boys, 1% probably isn't that bad.

Perhaps the Boy Scouts should take a cue from the radical Islamics I described above. Although their values are offensive to ours, the Islamic jihad appeals to the suppressed maledom now considered preferable in the west. There's a generation of boys out there in a sea of secular meaninglessness looking for something with clear and viable values. Also, we're in an age where the "establishment" values that scouting represented when we were kids are now actually "counter cultural". Perhaps scouting is ready for resurgence if they can tap into this, and again be about molding young boys into strong, moral, responsible men in a sea of mediocrity.

Thank you @John.. it's appreciated. Used to be much fun, it seemed easy & we made many life friends in Scouting. Now it's more difficult & more frustrating but I do enjoy the progression from boys to Scouts to good young men with values & skills. That has changed very little. In Round #2 years ago it was OUR troop & I was Scoutmaster with a great, large & active Committee. We also provided outdoor training and experience for several young girls in the troop family which Girl Scouts was not providing. It was never a problem. Good times back then; some our our best work.

Stilton: I love your cartoons and commentary, and often share them with friends and family. You have a spark of genius, and a gift for word crafting. Thank you for the much-needed (in)sanity and laughter!

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